In 2010, FINRA warned that HYIP scammers may provide a “Typo Tip-Off.” In 2013, an enterprise whose affiliates are targeting victims of the alleged Profitable Sunrise pyramid scheme says it is trying to attract “costumers.”

Biwako Bank Limited caught our attention yesterday after a boat-shark appeared on a Facebook Profitable Sunrise site to promote it while making this claim: “**THIS IS NOT AN HYIP , THIS IS A BANK**”

The claim is at odds with a claim on the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum that Biwako has a “GoldCoders’ HYIP Manager License.”

“Watch out for online postings, website copy or emails that are riddled with typos and poor grammar,” FINRA said. “This is often a tip-off that scammers are at work.”

Now, with Profitable Sunrise apparently dead in the water after actions by the SEC and numerous state and provincial regulators in the United States and Canada over the past two months, Biwako is informing prospects in a video playing on its website that the enterprise exists to connect “costumers” to new opportunities. It also claims that compounding is “avaliable.”

Meanwhile, it publishes an investment calculator and appears to imply an association with CNN and Time magazine.

And despite a Facebook boat-shark’s claim that Biwako is not an HYIP, the website of the purported “opportunity” lists four color-coded “plans” that purport to provide daily payouts of between 1.95 percent and 3.05 percent. The highest-paying plan — the “Red Plan” at 3.05 percent a day — advertises a percentage even higher than the purported “Long Haul” plan of Profitable Sunrise.

Like Profitable Sunrise, Biwako also is being promoted on the Ponzi boards.

Also see March 27 PP Blog story about Facebook boat-sharking and March 31 story. (The March 31 story reports that promotions for a “program” known as TelexFree claim participants can purchase an income that varies by the amount they invest. Under one scenario outlined in a video, participants who send in $15,125 purportedly are buying an income of $1,100 a week for a year.)

“Hundreds people involved in a pyramid scheme in Anhui blocked a road in Hefei, the provincial capital, to protest against a police crackdown on the scheme’s operators, fearing the loss of their investment.

“For three hours, some 300 people blocked a road and shouted insults at policemen and urban management officials who arrived to open the road . . .”

“He was simply too much of a threat to the system,” said Mr. Escobar, interviewed recently alongside others clamoring for Mr. Murcia’s release at a hunger strike here. For a visitor, they broke into a chant: “Crea en Dios y en David Murcia” (“Believe in God and in David Murcia”).